Ford's quality ranking

[TimSuds]

Guess it's not just me...

The brand's ranking fell 10 spots in Consumer Reports' annual auto reliability survey, hurt by glitchy touch screens and transmissions. It now ranks 20th out of 28 major brands, based on a survey of the magazine's subscribers.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/money/29582541/detail.html

I share my total dissatisfaction with anyone that will listen and apparently so are others...

 

[peterk9]

Guess it's not just me...

The brand's ranking fell 10 spots in Consumer Reports' annual auto reliability survey, hurt by glitchy touch screens and transmissions. It now ranks 20th out of 28 major brands, based on a survey of the magazine's subscribers.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/money/29582541/detail.html

I share my total dissatisfaction with anyone that will listen and apparently so are others...

Not me. I think it is a great vehicle. Like it better everytime I drive it.

 

[edman1000]

Not one problem with mine. It's got to be one of the nicest if not the nicest vehicles I've ever owned! I have the my touch and it works flawlessly.

 

[NEWPORTNJ]

I love mines enjoy it every time i drive it and mybe if ford would have given the writer a free explorer it would have wound up as number 1. Or payed the write like everyone else gets those nice gift under the table at a resturant lol funny but ture trust me !!

 

[edman1000]

I agree, Ford is being smart with their money lately so they probably gave the writers less then the Jap companies!!! CR is just a Toyota sponsored rag anyway!

 

[Jackal01]

Best vehicle I have ever owned. On par with my moms Infinty G35 and nicer than my dads 300m. Other than the A pillar noise (which is not often and pretty quiet) no issues.

 

[gdecamp]

Excellent design, great ride....broken MFT that needs to be fixed. That is the problem noted in Consumer Reports and Motor Trend, among others. They didn't all just make this stuff up!

 

[K1200rsport]

If you all quit complaining about MFT, it will go up again, hahaha....

 

[Rocketfan]

I wish I had paid attention to CR more before I bought. First few months, I was posting how wonderful the car was but since then, MFT has been a constant source of frustrating bugs and inconsistent outages of features. Ford's reputation is now suffering because of this. I am not happy about this in that it does not validate my purchase but am happy if it gets Ford to finally fix MFT.

 

[NEWPORTNJ]

If ford would have done like the late steve jobs and be very **** when releaseing some thing that would have wowed the explorer together with the great design this would have been the best built in america vehicle. But all and all its an awesome vehicle and i beleave that ford will fix it right its simple gooooooooooooo aaaaapppppplllllllllleeee pay the money and let apple re design the mft they will call it I F T( I FORD TOUCH )

 

[maerlim]

Let's hope the next MFT update fixes all those problems. I also checked into the CR report and it cited MFT as the main quality concern, plus some transmission issues in other vehicles (not the Ex).

 

[boss377]

Excellent design, great ride....broken MFT that needs to be fixed. That is the problem noted in Consumer Reports and Motor Trend, among others. They didn't all just make this stuff up!

They didn't just make it up, but they listened to a tiny cross-section of owners that were having problems (I'm convinced that some systems were working but not understood by the drivers), and exaggerated the problem to seem like it was widespread.
My wife refuses to learn how to use it, so thinks it is poorly designed because she can't master it!
There's no way the knuckleheads at CR could have figured it out in the few minutes they had with the car. And furthermore, they were gunning for the Explorer anyway. It wasn't a Honda.
I love this Explorer, and can't wait to drive it each day.

 

[gdecamp]

They didn't just make it up, but they listened to a tiny cross-section of owners that were having problems .

So I guess the reverse is true also? The #1 car is also because a tiny number of owners raved about it or is it because they were paid off?

It's really larger than you think....ask your service manager. That said, I am glad you have no problems, some of us have them all the time....and by the way I worked on a masters in computer science. That certainly doesn't make me an expert...far from it, just wanted to say I do know some technology.

I am frustrated because they fixed it twice already and flat out told me they are waiting for Ford to issue a fix and cannot do much until they do, all they can do is reinstall the same software. The Ford service manager also told me they have many customers with the exact same problem which is why Ford is "allegedly" (my emphasis) working on a fix. I think the President of Ford also admitted there is a problem with MFT so it is not just a tiny cross section, it is also the president of the company and the service managers at the dealerships!

I hope I can love mine again as much as you do and I once did for the first 3 months I had it.

 

[Spengracin]

The quality is much better than before, see the Ford Story, on tv, it real interesting, the CEO sent his executive staff to CR so they could tell Ford what the issues were, they did listen. With that said, the technology, is just a poor software/processor design, Ford just needs to replace all of them. All the other issues, again, they over thought the process, make it good, make it last. The engineers were over their heads on design vrs functionality.

 

[GCDMD]

I saw that CR report and couldn't help but agree. Ford completely lied to us about our 2011 Escape that i recently bought for my wife. They said the fuel economy would be 19/21 (ish) and she gets 25/29! Total lies. The sales manager told us we would have the old, slow navigation system as it hasn't been updated. Hasn't glitched once and has always been spot on. Again, another lie! I just can't take it any more!!!! Oh yeah, they didn't even charge us for the heated seats. Ford quality has just gone soooo downhill. CR claims the interior of the escape was lackluster, a friend of mine who owns a 2010 lexus was super impressed with the quiet ride.

Give me a break. Their "glitches" have virtually NOTHING to do with reliability. CR has never been credible, they have just confirmed that with their newest ratings.

 

[aznkidlee]

My previous car was a 2008 Scion Tc and I didn't expect it to rank #1. I put 73,000+ miles on it and had no major issues. I loved the car however, I outgrew the car and I wanted a SUV. I chose the Explorer because the exterior looks awesome and it is very high tech.

I feel like reliability should be related to Mechanical and not software. If the MFT breaks down, I'm sure the car will still drive fine. Yeah it is slow from time to time and it freezes and Microsoft is part of the development but I dont think they should drop that much in rank. I wonder one kind of CPU and RAM the car has. Its possible that the software is too advance to the hardware.

 

[2011EX]

I saw that CR report and couldn't help but agree. Ford completely lied to us about our 2011 Escape that i recently bought for my wife. They said the fuel economy would be 19/21 (ish) and she gets 25/29! Total lies. The sales manager told us we would have the old, slow navigation system as it hasn't been updated. Hasn't glitched once and has always been spot on. Again, another lie! I just can't take it any more!!!! Oh yeah, they didn't even charge us for the heated seats. Ford quality has just gone soooo downhill. CR claims the interior of the escape was lackluster, a friend of mine who owns a 2010 lexus was super impressed with the quiet ride.

Give me a break. Their "glitches" have virtually NOTHING to do with reliability. CR has never been credible, they have just confirmed that with their newest ratings.

Quality has nothing to do with your perception of the features. It is how the car functions compared to the rest of the market. CR reports back the actual number of problems and types based on dealer claims. They don't make this stuff up, if so they would be sued big time.

Why does it matter, if you love the car and it hasn't given you any problems.....who cares right?

 

[Torper7]

CR report

Has anyone considered returning or trading in the vehicle? I am seriously considering it, for a Toyota. I have had the EX for 6 months and it has been back at the dealer 5 times. Now a headlight is out (not a huge deal) ..... however, you do not expect these types of things to occur so soon. I am seriously concerned about the long term cost of this vehicle.

 

[peterk9]

Has anyone considered returning or trading in the vehicle? I am seriously considering it, for a Toyota. I have had the EX for 6 months and it has been back at the dealer 5 times. Now a headlight is out (not a huge deal) ..... however, you do not expect these types of things to occur so soon. I am seriously concerned about the long term cost of this vehicle.

You didn't mention which Toyota. I had 3 Highlander Limiteds ('02,'06 & '09). The '09 still had 2 1/2 years left on the lease. Got someone to take over the lease and I'm now driving the Explorer. I've had the Ex almost 8 months and couldn't be happier, so far. By the way, the Highlanders were trouble free, as has been my Ex.
And, Yes, there have been a few posts inquiring about what the Ex would be worth on a trade or outright sale.

 

[Torper7]

We are considering either the 12 highlander or Camry. I absolutely love my EX - but I'm not sure how much longer I want to be going back to the Dealerahip once a month. What's the likelihood that I can drive the EX 150k without having major mechanical or computer problems? Im pretty confident I can drive any Toyota that far and have NO major problems.

It's disappointing - I thought ford had come to the point where they could match up with the big boys in terms of reliability.